E 

D3CS 


IC-NRLF 


DAVIS 

' 


University  of  California. 

FROM   THE    LIBRARY   OF 

DR.    FRANCIS     LIEBER, 
Professor  of  History  and  Law  in  Columbia  College,  New  York. 


THK  GIFT  OF 

MICHAEL    REESE, 

Of  San  Francisco. 

1873. 


ORATION 


ON    THE 


LIFE    AND    CHARACTER 


OF 


HEIRY  WINTER  DAYIS 


BY 


HON.  JOHN  A.  J.  CRESWELL, 


Delivered  in  the  Hall  of  the  House  of  Kepresentatives, 
February  22,  1866, 


WASHINGTON: 

GOVERNMENT    PRINTING    OFFICE. 

1866. 


PREFACE. 


The  death  of  Hon.  HENRY  WINTER  DAVIS,  for  many  years  a  distinguished 
Representative  of  one  of  the  Baltimore  congressional  districts,  created  a  deep 
sensation  among  those  who  had  been  associated  with  him  in  national  legis 
lation,  and  they  deemed  it  fitting  to  pay  to  his  memory  unusual  honors.  They 
adopted  resolutions  expressive  of  their  grief,  and  invited  Hon.  JOHN  A.  J. 
CRESWELL,  a  Senator  of  the  United  States  from  the  State  of  Maryland,  to  deliver 
an  oration  on  his  life  and  character,  in  the  hall  of  the  House  of  Representatives, 
on  the  22d  of  February,  a  day  the  recurrence  of  which  ever  gives  increased 
warmth  to  patriotic  emotions. 

The  hall  of  the  House  was  filled  by  a  distinguished  audience  to  listen  to  the 
oration.  Before  eleven  o'clock  the  galleries  were  crowded  in  every  part.  The 
flags  above  the  Speaker's  desk  were  draped  in  black,  and  other  insignia  of 
mourning  were  exhibited.  An  excellent  portrait  of  the  late  Hon.  HENRY 
WINTER  DAVIS  was  visible  through  the  folds  of  the  national  banner  above  the 
Speaker's  chair.  As  on  the  occasion  of  the  oration  on  President  LINCOLN  by 
Hon.  GEORGE  BANCROFT,  the  Marine  band  occupied  the  ante-room  of  the 
reporters'  gallery,  and  discoursed  appropriate  music. 

At  twelve  o'clock  the  senators  entered,  and  the  judges  of  the  Supreme  Court, 
preceded  by  Chief  Justice  Chase.  Of  the  Cabinet  Secretary  Stanton  and  Sec 
retary  McCulloch  were  present.  After  prayer  by  the  chaplain,  the  Declaration 
of  Independence  was  read  by  Hon.  EDWARD  McPHERSON,  Clerk  of  the 
House.  After  the  reading  of  the  Declaration,  followed  by  the  playing  of  a 
dirge  by  the  band,  Hon.  SCHUYLER  COLFAX,  Speaker  of  the  House  of  Repre 
sentatives,  introduced  the  orator  of  the  day,  Hon.  J.  A.  J.  CRESWELL. 


R  E  M  A  R  K  S 

OF 

HON.  SCHUYLER  COLFAX, 

SPEAKER  OF   THE   HOUSE   OF   REPRESENTATIVES. 


Hon.  SCHUYLER  COLFAX,  Speaker  of  the  House  of  Representatives, 
said : 

LADIES  AND  GENTLEMEN:  The  duty  has  been  devolved  upon  me 
of  introducing  to  you  the  friend  and  fellow-member,  here,  of  HENRY 
WINTER  DAVIS,  and  I  shall  detain  you  but  a  moment  from  his 
address,  to  which  you  will  listen  with  saddened  interest. 

The  world  always  appreciates  and  honors  courage  :  the  courage 
of  Christianity,  which  sustained  rnartys  in  the  amphitheatre,  at  the 
stake,  and  on  the  rack ;  the  courage  of  Patriotism,  which  inspired 
millions  in  our  own  land  to  realize  the  historic  fable  of  Curtius,  and 
to  fill  up  with  their  own  bodies,  if  need  be,  the  yawning  chasm 
which  imperiled  the  republic;  the  courage  of  Humanity,  which  is 
witnessed  in  the  pest-house  and  the  hospital,  at  the  death-bed  of  the 
homeless  and  the  prison-cell  of  the  convict.  But  there  is  a  courage 
of  Statesmen,  besides;  and  nobly  was  it  illustrated  by  the  statesman 
whose  national  services  we  commemorate  to-day.  Inflexibly  hostile 
to  oppression,  whether  of  slaves  on  American  soil  or  of  republicans 
struggling  in  Mexico  against  monarchical  invasion,  faithful  always 
to  principle  and  liberty,  championing  always  the  cause  of  the  down 
trodden,  fearless  as  he  was  eloquent  in  his  avowals,  he  was  mourned 
throughout  a  continent;  and  from  the  Patapsco  to  the  Gulf  the 
blessings  of  those  who  had  been  ready  to  perish  followed  him  to  his 
tomb.  It  is  fitting,  therefore,  though  dying  a  private  citizen,  that 
the  nation  should  render  him  such  marked  and  unusual  honors  in 
this  hall,  the  scene  of  so  many  of  his  intellectual  triumphs ;  and  I 
have  great  pleasure  in  introducing  to  you,  as  the  orator  of  the  day, 
Hon.  J.  A.  J.  CRESWELL,  his  colleague  in  the  thirty-eighth  Congress, 
and  now  Senator  from  the  State  of  Maryland. 


ORATION 


OF 


HON,  JOHN  A.  J,  CRESWELL. 


MY  COUNTRYMEN:  On  the  22d  day  of  February,  1732, 
God  gave  to  the  world  the  highest  type  of  humanity,  in 
the  person  of  George  Washington.  Combining  within 
himself  the  better  qualities  of  the  soldier,  sage,  states 
man,  and  patriot,  alike  brave,  wise,  discreet,  and  incor 
ruptible,  the  common  consent  of  mankind  has  awarded 
him  the  incomparable  title  of  Father  of  his  Country. 
Among  all  nations  and  in  every  clime  the  richest 
treasures  of  language  have  been  exhausted  in  the  effort 
to  transmit  to  posterity  a  faithful  record  of  his  deeds. 
For  him  unfading  laurels  are  secure,  so  long  as  letters 
shall  survive  and  history  shall  continue  to  be  the  guide 
and  teacher  of  civilized  men.  The  whole  human  race 
has  become  the  self-appointed  guardian  of  his  fame, 
and  the  name  of  Washington  will  be  ever  held,  over  all 
the  earth,  to  be  synonymous  with  the  highest  perfection 
attainable  in  public  or  private  life,  and  coeternal  with 
that  immortal  love  to  which  reason  and  revelation  have 
together  toiled  to  elevate  human  aspirations — the  love 
of  liberty,  restrained  and  guarded  by  law. 

But  in  the  presence  of  the  Omnipotent  how  insignifi 
cant  is  the  proudest  and  the  noblest  of  men!  Even 
Washington,  who  alone  of  his  kind  could  fill  that  com 
prehensive  epitome  of  General  Henry  Lee,  so  often  on 
our  lips,  "First  in  war,  first  in  peace,  and  first  in  the 


8  ORATION  ON  THE  LIFE  AND   CHARACTER 

hearts  of  his  countrymen,"  was  allowed  no  exemption 
from  the  common  lot  of  mortals.  In  the  sixty-eighth 
year  of  his  age  he,  too,  paid  the  debt  of  nature. 

The  dread  announcement  of  his  demise  sped  over 
the  land  like  a  pestilence,  burdening  the  very  air  with 
mourning,  and  carrying  inexpressible  sorrow  to  every 
household  and  every  heart.  The  course  of  legislation 
was  stopped  in  mid  career  to  give  expression  to  the 
grief  of  Congress,  and  by  resolution,  approved  January 
6,  1800,  the  22d  of  February  of  that  year  was  devoted 
to  national  humiliation  and  lamentation.  This  is,  then, 
as  well  a  day  of  sorrow  as  a  day  of  rejoicing. 

More  recent  calamities  also  remind  us  that  death  is 
universal  king.  Just  ten  days  ago  our  great  historian 
pronounced  in  this  hall  an  impartial  judgment  upon  the 
earthly  career  of  him  who,  as  savior  of  his  country,  will 
be  counted  as  the  compeer  of  Washington.  Scarce 
have  the  orator's  lingering  tones  been  mellowed  into 
silence,  scarce  has  the  glowing  page  whereon  his  words 
were  traced  lost  the  impress  of  his  passing  hand,  yet 
we  are  again  called  into  the  presence  of  the  Inexorable 
to  crown  one  more  illustrious  victim  with  sacrificial 
flowers.  Having  taken  up  his  lifeless  body,  as  beautiful 
as  the  dead  Absalom,  and  laid  it  in  the  tomb  with  be 
coming  solemnity,  we  have  assembled  in  the  sight  of 
the  world  to  do  deserved  honor  to  the  name  and  mem 
ory  of  HENRY  WINTER  DAVIS,  a  native  of  Annapolis,  in 
the  State  of  Maryland,  but  always  proudly  claiming  to 
be  no  less  than  a  citizen  of  the  United  States  of 
America. 

We  have  not  convened  in  obedience  to  any  formal 


OF  HENRY  WINTER  DAVIS. 


custom,  requiring  us  to  assume  an  empty  show  of  be 
reavement,  in  order  that  we  may  appear  respectful  to 
the  departed.  We  who  knew  HENRY  WINTER  DAVIS 
are  not  content  to  clothe  ourselves  in  the  outward  garb 
of  grief,  and  call  the  semblance  of  mourning  a  fitting 
tribute  to  the  gifted  orator  and  statesman,  so  suddenly 
snatched  from  our  midst  in  the  full  glory  of  his  mental 
and  bodily  strength.  We  would  do  more  than  "bear 
about  the  mockery  of  woe."  Prompted  by  a  genuine 
affection,  we  desire  to  ignore  all  idle  and  merely  con 
ventional  ceremonies,  and  permit  our  stricken  hearts  to 
speak  their  spontaneous  sorrow. 

Here,  then,  where  he  sat  for  eight  years  as  a  Repre 
sentative  of  the  people;  where  friends  have  trooped 
about  him,  and  admiring  crowds  have  paid  homage  to 
his  genius;  where  grave  legislators  have  yielded  them 
selves  willing  captives  to  his  eloquence,  and  his  wise 
counsel  has  moulded,  in  no  small  degree,  the  law  of  a 
great  nation,  let  us,  in  dealing  with  what  he  has' left  us, 
verify  the  saying  of  Bacon,  "Death  openeth  the  good 
fame  and  extinguished!  envy."  Remembering  that  he 
was  a  man  of  like  passions  and  equally  fallible  with 
ourselves,  let  us  review  his  life  in  a  spirit  of  generous 
candor,  applaud  what  is  good,  and  try  to  profit  by  it; 
and  if  we  find  aught  of  ill,  let  us,  so  far  as  justice  and 
truth  will  permit,  cover  it  with  the  vail  of  charity  and 
bury  it  out  of  sight  forever.  So  may  our  survivors  do 
for  us. 

The  subject  of  this  address  was  born  on  the  16th  of 
August,  1817. 

His  father,  Rev.  Henry  Lyon  Davis,  of  the  Protestant 


10  ORATION  ON  THE  LIFE  AND  CHARACTER 

Episcopal  church,  was  president  of  St.  John's  College 
at  Annapolis,  Maryland,  and  rector  of  St.  Ann's  parish. 
He  was  of  imposing  person,  and  great  dignity  and  force 
of  character.  He  was,  moreover,  a  man  of  genius,  and 
of  varied  and  profound  learning,  eminently  versed  in 
mathematics  and  natural  sciences,  abounding  in  class 
ical  lore,  endowed  with  a  vast  memory,  and  gifted  with 
a  concise,  clear,  and  graceful  style;  rich  and  fluent  in 
conversation,  but  without  the  least  pretension  to  oratory 
and  wholly  incapable  of  extempore  speaking.  He  was 
removed  from  the  presidency  of  St.  John's  by  a  board 
of  democratic  trustees  because  of  his  federal  politics; 
and,  years  afterward,  he  gave  his  son  his  only  lesson  in 
politics  at  the  end  of  a  letter,  addressed  to  him  when 
at  Kenyon  College,  in  this  laconic  sentence:  "My  son, 
beware  of  the  follies  of  Jacksonism." 

His  mother  was  Jane  Brown  Winter,  a  woman  of 
elegant  accomplishments  and  of  great  sweetness  of 
disposition  and  purity  of  life.  It  might  be  truthfully 
said  of  her,  that  she  was  an  exemplar  for  all  who  knew 
her.  She  had  only  two  children,  Henry  Winter,  and 
Jane,  who  married  Rev.  Edward  Syle. 

The  education  of  Henry  Winter  began  very  early, 
at  home,  under  the  care  of  his  aunt,  Elizabeth  Brown 
Winter,  who  entertained  the  most  rigid  and  exacting 
opinions  in  regard  to  the  training  of  children,  but  who 
was  withal  a  noble  woman.  He  once  playfully  said,  "I 
could  read  before  I  was  four  years  old,  though  much 
against  my  will."  When  his  father  was  removed  from 
St.  John's,  he  went  to  Wilmington,  Delaware,  but  some 
time  elapsed  before  he  became  settled  there.  Mean- 


OF  HENRY  WINTER  DAVIS.  11 


while,  Henry  Winter  remained  with  his  aunt  in  Alex 
andria,  Virginia.  He  afterward  went  to  Wilmington, 
and  was  there  instructed  under  his  father's  supervision. 
In  1827  his  father  returned  to  Maryland  and  settled  in 
Anne  Arundel  counly. 

After  reaching  Anne  Arundel,  Henry  Winter  became 
so  much  devoted  to  out-door  life  that  he  gave  small 
promise  of  scholarly  proficiency.  He  affected  the 
sportsman,  and  became  a  devoted  disciple  of  Nimrod; 
accompanied  always  by  one  of  his  father's  slaves  he 
roamed  the  country  with  a  huge  old  fowling-piece  on 
his  shoulder,  burning  powder  in  abundance,  but  doing 
little  damage  otherwise.  While  here  he  saw  much  of 
slaves  and  slavery,  and  what  he  saw  impressed  him  pro 
foundly,  and  laid  the  foundation  for  those  opinions  which 
he  so  heroically  and  constantly  defended  in  all  his  after 
life.  Referring  to  this  period,  he  said  long  afterward, 
"  My  familiar  association  with  the  slaves  while  a  boy 
gave  me  great  insight  into  their  feelings  and  views. 
They  spoke  with  freedom  before  a  boy  what  they  would 
have  repressed  before  a  man.  They  were  far  from 
indifferent  to  their  condition ;  they  felt  wronged  and 
sighed  for  freedom.  They  were  attached  to  my  father 
and  loved  me,  yet  they  habitually  spoke  of  the  day  when 
God  would  deliver  them." 

He  subsequently  went  to  Alexandria,  and  was  sent 
to  school  at  Howard,  near  the  Theological  Seminary, 
and  from  Howard  he  went  to  Kenyon  College,  in  Ohio, 
in  the  fall  of  1833. 

Kenyon  was  then  in  the  first  year  of  the  presidency 
of  Bishop  Mcllvaine.  It  was  the  centre  of  vast  forests, 


12  ORATION  ON  THE  LIFE  AND    CHARACTER 

broken  only  by  occasional  clearings,  excepting  along 
the  lines  of  the  National  road,  and  the  Ohio  river  and 
its  navigable  tributaries.  In  this  wilderness  of  nature, 
but  garden  of  letters,  he  remained,  at  first  in  the  gram 
mar  school,  and  then  in  the  college,  until  the  6th  of 
September,  1837;  when  at  twenty  years  of  age  he 
took  his  degree  and  diploma,  decorated  with  one  of  the 
honorary  orations  of  his  class,  on  the  great  day  of  com 
mencement.  His  subject  was  "Scholastic  Philosophy." 
At  the  end  of  the  Freshman  year,  a  change  in  the 
college  terms  gave  him  a  vacation  of  three  months.  In 
stead  of  spending  it  in  idleness,  as  he  might  have  done,, 
and  as  most  boys  would  have  done,  he  availed  himself 
of  this  interval  to  pursue  and  complete  the  studies  of 
the  Sophomore  year,  to  which  he  had  already  given 
some  attention  in  his  spare  moments.  At  the  opening 
of  the  next  session  he  passed  the  examination  for  the 
Junior  class.  Fortunately  I  have  his  own  testimony 
and  opinion  as  to  this  exploit,  and  I  give  them  in  his 
o\vn  language: 

''It  was  a  pretty  sharp  trial  of  resolution  and  dogged  diligence, 
but  it  saved  me  a  year  of  college,  and  indurated  my  powers  of  study 
and  mental  culture  into  a  habit,  and  perhaps  enabled  me  to  stay 
long  enough  to  graduate.  I  do  not  recommend  the  example  to  those 
who  are  independently  situated,  for  learning  must  fall  like  the 
rain  in  such  gentle  showers  as  to  sink  in  if  it  is  to  be  fruitful ; 
when  poured  on  the  richest  soil  in  torrents,  it  not  only  runs  off 
without  strengthening  vegetation,  but  washes  away  the  soil  itself." 

His  college  life  was  laborious  and  successful.  The 
regular  studies  were  prosecuted  with  diligence,  and  from 
them  he  derived  great  profit,  not  merely  in  knowledge, 
but  in  what  is  of  vastly  more  account,  the  habit  and 


OF  HENRY  WINTER  DAVIS.  13 

power  of  mental  labor.  These  studies  were  wrought 
into  his  mind  and  made  part  of  the  intellectual  sub 
stance  by  the  vigorous  collisions  of  the  societies  in 
which  he  delighted.  For  these  mimic  conflicts  he  pre 
pared  assiduously,  not  in  writing,  but  always  with  a 
carefully  deduced  logical  analysis  and  arrangement  of 
the  thoughts  to  be  developed  in  the  order  of  argument, 
with  a  brief  note  of  any  quotation,  or  image,  or  illus 
tration,  on  the  margin  at  the  appropriate  place.  From 
that  brief  he  spoke.  And  this  was  his  only  method  of 
preparation  for  all  the  great  conflicts  in  which  he  took 
part  in  after  life.  He  never  wrote  out  his  speeches 
beforehand. 

Speaking  of  his  feelings  at  the  end  of  his  college 
life,  he  sadly  said: 

"My  father's  death  had  embittered  the  last  days  of  the  year 
1836,  and  left  me  without  a  counsellor.  I  knew  something  of  books, 
nothing  of  men,  and  I  went  forth  like  Adam  among  the  wild  beasts 
of  the  unknown  wilderness  of  the  world.  My  father  had  dedicated 
me  to  the  ministry,  but  the  day  had  gone  when  such  dedications 
determined  the  lives  of  young  man.  Theology  as  a  grave  topic  of 
historic  and  metaphysical  investigation  I  delighted  to  pursue,  but  for 
the  ministry  I  had  no  calling.  I  would  have  been  idle  if  I  could, 
for  I  had  no  ambition,  but  I  had  no  fortune  and  I  could  not  beg  or 
starve." 

All  who  were  acquainted  with  his  temperament  can 
well  imagine  what  a  gloomy  prospect  the  future  pre 
sented  to  him,  when  its  contemplation  wrung  from  his 
stoical  taciturnity  that  touching  confession. 

The  truth  is,  that  from  the  time  he  entered  college 
he  was  continually  cramped  for  want  of  money.  The 
negroes  ate  everything  that  was  produced  on  the  farm 


14  ORATION  ON  THE  LIFE  AND   CHARACTER 

in  Anne  Arundel,  a  gastronomic  feat  which  they  could 
easily  accomplish,  without  ever  having  cause  to  com 
plain  of  a  surfeit.  His  aunt,  herself  in  limited  circum 
stances,  by  a  careful  husbandry  of  her  means,  managed 
to  keep  him  at  college.  Kenyon  was  then  a  manual- 
labor  institution,  and  the  boys  were  required  to  sweep 
their  own  rooms,  make  their  own  beds  and  fires,  bring 
their  own  water,  black  their  own  boots,  if  they  ever 
were  blacked,  and  take  an  occasional  turn  at  grubbing 
in  the  fields  or  working  on  the  roads.  There  was  no 
royal  road  to  learning  known  at  Kenyon  in  those  days. 
Through  all  this  Henry  AYinter  Davis  passed,  bearing 
his  part  manfully ;  and  knowing  how  heavily  he  taxed 
the  slender  purse  of  his  aunt,  he  denied  himself  with 
such  rigor  that  he  succeeded,  incredible  as  it  may  ap 
pear,  in  bringing  his  total  expenses,  including  boarding 
and  tuition,  within  the  sum  of  eighty  dollars  per  annum. 
His  father  left  an  estate  consisting  only  of  some 
slaves,  which  were  equally  apportioned  between  him 
self  and  sister.  Frequent  applications  were  made  to 
purchase  his  slaves,  but  he  never  could  be  induced  to 
sell  them,  although  the  proceeds  would  have  enabled 
him  to  pursue  his  studies  with  ease  and  comfort.  He 
rather  sought  and  obtained  a  tutorship,  and  for  two 
years  he  devoted  to  law  and  letters  only  the  time  he 
could  rescue  from  its  drudgery.  In  a  letter,  written  in 
April,  1839,  replying  to  the  request  of  a  relative  who 
offered  to  purchase  his  slave  Sallie,  subject  to  the  pro 
visions  of  his  father's  will,  which  manumitted  her  if  she 
would  go  to  Liberia,  he  said:  "But  if  she  is  under  my 
control,"  (he  did  not  know  that  she  had  been  set  to  his 


OF  HENRY  WINTER  DAVIS.  15 


share,)  "I  will  not  consent  to  the  sale,  though  he  wishes 
to  purchase  her  subject  to  the  will."  And  so  Sallie 
was  not  sold,  and  Henry  Winter  Davis,  the  tutor,  toiled 
on  and  waited.  He  never  would  hold  any  of  his  slaves 
under  his  authority,  never  would  accept  a  cent  of  their 
wages,  and  tendered  each  and  all  of  them  a  deed  of 
absolute  manumission  whenever  the  law  would  allow. 
Tell  me,  wras  that  man  sincere  in  his  opposition  to 
slavery?  How  many  of  those  who  have  since  charged 
him  with  being  selfish  and  reckless  in  his  advocacy  of 
emancipation  wrould  have  shown  equal  devotion  to  prin 
ciple?  Not  one;  not  one.  Ah!  the  man  who  works 
and  suffers  for  his  opinions'  sake  places  his  own  flesh 
and  blood  in  pledge  for  his  integrity. 

Notwithstanding  his  irksome  and  exacting  duties,  he 
kept  his  eye  steadily  on  the  University  of  Virginia,  and 
read,  without  assistance,  a  large  part  of  its  course.  He 
delighted  especially  in  the  pungent  pages  of  Tacitus 
and  the  glowing  and  brilliant,  dignified  and  elevated 
epic  of  the  Decline  and  Fall  of  the  Roman  Empire. 
These  wrere  favorites  which  never  lost  their  charm  for 
him.  When  recently  on  a  visit  at  my  house,  he  stated 
in  conversation  that  he  often  exercised  himself  in  trans 
lating  from  the  former,  and  in  transferring  the  thoughts 
of  the  latter  into  his  own  language,  and  he  contended 
that  the  task  had  dispelled  the  popular  error  that 
Gibbon's  style  is  swollen  and  declamatory;  for  he 
alleged  that  every  effort  at  condensation  had  proved  a 
failure,  and  that  at  the  end  of  his  labors  the  page  he 
had  attempted  to  compress  had  always  expanded  to  the 


16  ORATION  ON  THE  LIFE  AND   CHARACTER 

eye,  when  relieved  of  the  weighty  and  stringent  fetters 
in  which  the  gigantic  genius  of  Gibbon  had  bound  it. 

About  this  time — the  only  period  when  doubts  beset 
him — he  was  tempted  by  a  very  advantageous  offer  to 
settle  in  Mississippi.  He  determined  to  accept;  but 
some  kind  spirit  interposed  to  prevent  the  despatch  of 
the  final  letter,  and  he  remained  in  Alexandria.  At 
last  his  aunt — second  mother  as  she  was — sold  some 
land  and  dedicated  the  proceeds  to  his  legal  studies. 
He  arrived  at  the  University  of  Virginia  in  October, 
1839. 

From  that  moment  he  entered  actively  and  unre 
mittingly  on  his  course  of  intellectual  training.  While 
a  boy  he  had  become  familiar,  under  the  guidance  of 
his  father,  with  the  classics  of  Addison,  Johnson,  Swift, 
Cowper,  and  Pope,  and  he  now  plunged  into  the 
domain  of  history.  He  had  begun  at  Kenyon  to  make 
flanking  forays  into  the  fields  of  historic  investigation 
which  lay  so  invitingly  on  each  side  of  the  regular 
march  of  his  college  course.  As  he  acquired  more 
information  and  confidence,  these  forays  became  more 
extensive  and  profitable.  It  was  then  the  transition 
period  from  the  shallow  though  graceful  pages  of 
Gillies,  Rollin,  Russel,  and  Tytler,  and  the  rabbinical 
agglomerations  of  Shuckford  and  Prideaux  to  the 
modern  school  of  free,  profound,  and  laborious  investi 
gation,  which  has  reared  immortal  monuments  to  its 
memory  in  the  works  of  Hallam,  Macaulay,  Grote, 
Bancroft,  Prescott,  Motley,  Niebuhr,  Bunsen,  Schlosser, 
Thiers,  and  their  fellows.  But  of  the  last-named  none 
except  Niebuhr's  History  of  Rome  and  Hallam's  Middle 


OF  HENRY  WINTER  DAVIS.  17 

Ages  were  accessible  to  him  in  the  backwoods  of  Ohio. 
Cousin's  Course  of  the  History  of  Modern  Philosophy 
was  just  glittering  in  the  horizon,  and  Gibbon  shone 
alone  as  the  morning  star  of  the  day  of  historic  research, 
which  he  had  heralded  so  long.  The  French  Revolu 
tion  he  had  seen  only  as  presented  in  Burke's  brilliant 
vituperation  and  Scott's  Tory  diatribe.  A  republican 
picture  of  the  great  republican  revolution,  the  fountain 
of  all  that  is  now  tolerable  in  Europe,  had  not  then 
been  presented  on  any  authentic  and  comprehensive 
page. 

Not  only  these,  but  all  historical  works  of  value 
which  the  English,  French,  and  German  languages  can 
furnish,  with  an  immense  amount  of  other  intellectual 
pabulum,  were  eagerly  gathered,  consumed  with  vora 
cious  appetite,  and  thoroughly  digested.  Supplied  at 
last  with  the  required  means,  he  braced  himself  for  a 
systematic  curriculum  of  law,  and  pursued  it  with 
marked  constancy  and  success.  While  at  the  univer 
sity  he  also  took  up  the  German  and  French  languages 
and  mastered  them,  and  he  perfected  his  scholarship  in 
Latin  and  Greek.  Until  his  death  he  read  all  these 
languages  with  great  facility  and  accuracy,  and  he 
always  kept  his  Greek  Testament  lying  on  his  table  for 
easy  reference. 

After  a  thorough  course  at  the  university,  Mr.  DAVIS 
entered  upon  the  practice  of  the  law  in  Alexandria, 
Virginia.  He  began  his  profession  without  much  to 
cheer  him;  but  he  was  not  the  man  to  abandon  a  pur 
suit  for  lack  of  courage.  His  ability  and  industry 
attracted  attention,  and  before  long  he  had  acquired  a 


18  ORATION  ON  THE  LIFE  AND  CHARACTER 

respectable  practice,  which  thenceforth  protected  him 
from  all  annoyances  of  a  pecuniary  nature.  He  toiled 
with  unwearied  assiduity,  never  appearing  in  the  trial 
of  a  cause  without  the  most  elaborate  and  exhaustive 
preparation,  and  soon  became  known  to  his  professional 
brethren  as  a  valuable  ally  and  a  formidable  foe. 
His  natural  aptitude  for  public  affairs  made  itself 
manifest  in  due  time,  and  some  articles  which  he 
prepared  on  municipal  and  State  politics  gave  him 
great  reputation.  He  also  published  a  series  of  news 
paper  essays,  wherein  he  dared  to  question  the  divinity 
of  slavery;  and  these,  though  at  the  time  thought  to  be 
not  beyond  the  limits  of  free  discussion,  were  cited 
against  him  long  after  as  evidence  that  he  was  a  heretic 
in  pro-slavery  Virginia  and  Maryland. 

On  the  30th  of  October,  1845,  he  married  Miss  Con 
stance  T.  Gardiner,  daughter  of  William  C.  Gardiner, 
Esq.,  a  most  accomplished  and  charming  young  lady,  as 
beautiful  and  as  fragile  as  a  flower.  She  lived  to 
gladden  his  heart  for  but  a  few  years,  and  then, 

"Like  a  lily  drooping, 
She  bowed  her  head  and  died." 

In  1850  he  came  to  Baltimore,  and  immediately  a 
high  position,  professional,  social,  and  political,  was 
awarded  him.  His  forensic  efforts  at  once  commanded 
attention  and  enforced  respect.  The  young  men  of 
most  ability  and  promise  gathered  about  him,  and  made 
him  the  centre  of  their  chosen  circle.  He  became  a 
prominent  member  of  the  whig  party,  and  was  every 
where  known  as  the  brilliant  orator  and  successful  con- 


OF  HENRY  WINTER  DAVIS  19 


trovertist  of  the  Scott  campaign  of  1852.  The  whig 
party,  worn  out  by  its  many  gallant  but  unsuccessful 
battles,  was  ultimately  gathered  to  its  fathers,  and  Mr. 
DAVIS  led  off  in  the  American  movement.  He  was 
elected  successively  to  the  thirty- fourth,  thirty-fifth,  and 
thirty-sixth  Congresses  by  the  American  party  from 
the  fourth  district  of  Maryland.  He  supported  with 
great  ability  and  zeal  Mr.  Fillmore  for  the  Presidency 
in  1856,  and  in  1860  accepted  John  Bell  as  the  candi 
date  of  his  party,  though  he  clearly  divined  and  plainly 
announced  that  the  great  battle  was  really  between 
Abraham  Lincoln,  as  the  representative  of  the  national 
sentiment  on  the  one  hand,  and  secession  and  disunion, 
in  all  their  shades  and  phases,  on  the  other.  To  his 
seat  in  the  thirty-eighth  Congress  he  was  elected  by 
the  Unconditional  Union  party. 

Since  the  adjournment  of  the  thirty-eighth  Congress 
he  has  been  profoundly  concerned  in  the  momentous 
public  questions  now  pressing  for  adjustment,  and  he 
did  not  fail  on  several  fitting  occasions  to  give  his  views 
at  length  to  the  public.  Nevertheless,  he  frequently 
alluded  to  his  earnest  desire  to  retreat  for  awhile  from 
the  perplexing  annoyances  of  public  life.  He  had 
determined  upon  a  long  visit  to  Europe  in  the  coining 
spring,  and  had  almost  concluded  the  purchase  of  a 
delightful  country-seat,  where  he  hoped  to  recruit  his 
weary  brain  for  years  to  come  from  the  exhaustless 
riches  of  nature.  When  the  thirty-ninth  Congress 
met,  and  he  read  of  his  old  companions  in  the  work  of 
legislation  again  gathering  in  their  halls  and  committee- 
rooms,  I  think,  for  at  least  a  day  or  two,  he  felt  a 


20 


ORATION  OX  THE  LIFE  AND  CHARACTER 


longing  to  be  among  them.     During  the  second  week 
of  the  session  he  again   entered    this    hall,   but    only 
as  a  spectator.     The  greeting  he  received — so  general, 
spontaneous,  and  cordial — from  gentlemen  on  both  sides 
of  the  House,  touched  his  heart  most  sensibly.     The 
crowd  that  gathered  about  him  was  so  great  that  the 
party  was  obliged  to  retire  to  one  of  the  larger  ante 
rooms  for  fear  of  interrupting  the  public  business.     A 
delightful  interview  among  old  friends  was  the  reward. 
He  was  charmed  with  his  reception,  and  mentioned  it 
to  me  with  intense  satisfaction.     Little  did  you,  gentle 
men,  then  think  that  between  you  and  a  beloved  friend 
the  curtain  that  shrouds  eternity  was  so   soon  to  be 
interposed.     His  sickness  was  of  about  a  week's  dura 
tion.      Until    the    morning  of  the    day   preceding   his 
death,  his  friends  never  doubted  his  recovery.     Later 
in  the  day  very  unfavorable  symptoms  appeared,  and  all 
then    realized    his    danger.     In   the   evening  his  wife 
spoke  to  him  of  a  visit,  for  one  day,  which  he  had 
projected,  to  his  old  friend,  Mrs.  S.  F   Du  Pont,  when 
he  replied,  in  the  last  words  he  ever  uttered,  "It  shows 
the  folly  of  making  plans  even  for  a  day."     He  con 
tinued  to  fail  rapidly  in  strength  until  two  o'clock  on 
the  afternoon  of  Saturday,  the  30th  of  December,  when 
HENRY  WINTER  DAVIS,  in  the  forty-ninth  year  of  his 
age,  appeared  before  his  God.     His  death  confirmed 
the    opinion    of  Sir   Thomas    Browne,   who    declared, 
"Marshaling  all  the  horrors  of  death,  and  contemplating 
the  extremities  thereof,  I  find  not  anything  therein  able 
to  daunt  the  courage  of  a  man,  much  less  a  well-resolved 


OF  HENRY  WINTER  DAVIS.  21 

Christian!'     He  passed  away  so   quietly   that  no   one 
knew  the  moment  of  his  departure.     His  was — 

"  A  death,  life  sleep ; 
A  gentle  wafting  to  immortal  life." 

Mr.  DAVIS  left  a  widow,  Mrs.  Nancy  Davis,  a  daughter 
of  John  B.  Morris,  Esq.,  of  Baltimore,  and  two  little 
girls,  wTho  were  the  idols  of  his  heart.  He  was  married 
a  second  time  on  the  26th  of  January,  1857.  His 
nearest  surviving  collateral  relation  is  the  Hon.  David 
Davis,  associate  justice  of  the  Supreme  Court  of  the 
United  States,  who  is  his  only  cousin — german.  To  all 
these  afflicted  hearts  may  God  be  most  gracious. 

Thus  has  the  country  lost  one  of  the  most  able, 
eloquent,  and  fearless  of  its  defenders.  Called  from 
this  life  at  an  age  when  most  men  are  just  beginning  to 
command  the  respect  and  confidence  of  their  fellows, 
he  has  left,  nevertheless,  a  fame  as  wide  as  our  vast 
country.  He  died  nineteen  years  younger  than  Wash 
ington  and  eight  years  younger  than  Lincoln.  At  forty- 
eight  years  of  age  Washington  had  not  seen  the  glories 
of  Yorktown  even  in  a  vision,  nor  had  Lincoln  dreamed 
of  the  presidential  chair ;  and  if  they  had  died  at  that 
age  they  would  have  been  comparatively  unknown  in 
history.  Doubtless  God  would  have  raised  up  other 
leaders,  if  they  had  been  wanting,  to  conduct  the  great 
American  column,  which  He  has  chosen  to  be  the  body 
guard  of  human  rights  and  hopes,  onward  among  the 
nations  and  the  centuries;  but  in  that  event  the  12th 
and  22<1  days  of  February  would  not  be,  as  they  now 
are,  held  sacred  in  our  calendar. 


22  ORATION  ON  THE  LIFE  AND  CHARACTER 

Mr.  DAVIS  had  gathered  into  his  house  the  literary 
treasures  of  four  languages,  and  had  reveled  in  spirit 
with  the  wise  men  of  the  ages.  He  had  conned  his 
books  as  jealously  as  a  miner  peering  for  gold,  and  had 
not  left  a  panful  of  earth  unwashed.  He  had  collected 
the  purest  ore  of  truth  and  the  richest  gems  of  thought, 
until  he  was  able  to  crown  himself  with  knowledge. 
Blessed  with  a  felicitous  power  of  analysis  and  a  pro 
digious  memory,  he  ransacked  history,  ancient  and 
modern,  sacred  and  profane;  science,  pure,  empirical, 
and  metaphysical ;  the  arts,  mechanical  and  liberal ;  the 
professions,  law,  divinity,  and  medicine ;  poetry  and  the 
miscellanies  of  literature;  and  in  all  these  great  depart 
ments  of  human  lore  he  moved  as  easily  as  most  men 
do  in  their  particular  province.  His  habit  was  not  only 
to  read  but  to  reread  the  best  of  his  books  frequently, 
and  he  was  continually  supplying  himself  with  better 
editions  of  his  favorites.  In  current,  playful  conversation 
with  friends  he  quoted  right  and  left,  in  brief  and  at 
length,  from  the  classics,  ancient  and  modern,  and  from 
the  drama,  tragic  and  comic.  In  his  speeches,  on  the 
contrary,  he  quoted  but  little,  and  only  when  he  seemed 
to  run  upon  a  thought  already  expressed  by  some  one 
else  with  singular  force  and  appositeness.  He  was  the 
best  scholar  I  ever  met  for  his  years  and  active  life,  and 
was  surpassed  by  very  few,  excepting  mere  book- worms. 
He  has  for  many  years  been  engaged  in  collecting 
extracts  from  newspapers,  containing  the  leading  facts 
and  public  documents  of  the  day ;  but  he  never  common 
placed  from  books.  His  thesaurus  was  his  head. 

I  have  but  little  personal  knowledge  of  Mr.  DAVIS  as  a 


OF  HENRY  WINTER  DAVIS.  23 

lawyer.  It  was  never  my  good  fortune  to  be  associated 
with  him  in  the  trial  of  a  cause ;  nor  have  I  ever  been 
present  when  he  was  so  engaged.  But  at  the  time  of 
his  death  he  filled  a  high  position  at  the  bar,  and  was 
chosen  to  lead  against  the  most  distinguished  of  his 
brethren.  On  public  and  constitutional  questions,  as 
distinguished  from  those  involving  only  private  rights, 
he  was  a  host,  and  in  the  argument  of  the  cases  which 
grew  out  of  the  adoption  of  the  new  constitution  of 
Maryland  he  won  golden  laurels,  and  drew  extraordinary 
encomiums  even  from  his  opponents  in  that  angry 
litigation.  He  was  thoroughly  read  in  the  decisions  of 
the  federal  courts,  and  especially  in  those  declaring 
and  defining  constitutional  principles. 

Possessed  of  a  mind  of  remarkable  power,  scope,  and 
activity;  with  an  immense  fund  of  precious  information, 
ready  to  respond  to  any  call  he  might  make  upon  it, 
however  sudden;  wielding  a  system  of  logic  formed  in 
the  severest  school,  and  tried  by  long  practice ;  gifted 
with  a  rare  command  of  language  and  an  eloquence  well 
nigh  superhuman;  and  withal  graced  with  manners  the 
most  accomplished  and  refined,  and  a  person  unusually 
handsome,  graceful,  and  attractive.  Mr.  DAVIS  entered 
public  life  with  almost  unparalleled  personal  advantages. 
Having  boldly  presented  himself  before  the  most  rigorous 
tribunal  in  the  world,  he  proved  himself  worthy  of  its 
favor  and  attention.  He  soon  rose  to  the  front  rank  of 
debaters,  and  whenever  he  addressed  the  House  all  sides 
gave  him  a  delighted  audience. 

I  shall  not  attempt  a  review  of  the  topics  discussed 
in  the  thirty -fourth  and  thirty-fifth  Congresses.  The 


^mm^^jgy^^  ^ Q 

24  ORATION  ON  THE  LIFE  AND  CHARACTER 


day  was  fast  coming  when  contests  for  the  Speakership 
and  battles  over  appropriation  bills,  ay,  even  the  fierce 
struggle  over  Kansas,  would  sink  into  insignificance, 
and  Mr.  DAVIS,  with  that  political  prescience  for  which 
he  was  always  remarkable,  seemed  to  discern  the  first 
sign  of  the  coming  storm.  The  winds  had  been  long 
sown,  and  now  the  whirlwind  was  to  be  reaped.  The 
thirty-sixth  Congress,  which  had  opened  so  inauspi- 
ciously,  and  which  his  vote  had  saved  from  becoming  a 
perpetuated  bedlam,  met  for  its  second  session  on  the- 
3d  of  December,  1860,  with  the  clouds  of  civil  war  fast 
settling  down  upon  the  nation.  In  the  hope  that  war 
might  yet  be  averted,  on  the  fourth  day  of  the  session, 
the  celebrated  committee  of  thirty- three  was  raised, 
with  the  lamented  Corwin,  of  Ohio,  as  chairman,  and 
Mr.  DAVIS  as  the  member  from  Maryland.  When  the 
committee  reported,  Mr.  DAVIS  sustained  the  majority 
report  in  an  able  speech,  in  which,  after  urging  every 
argument  in  favor  of  the  report,  he  boldly  proclaimed 
his  own  views,  and  the  duties  of  his  State  and  country. 
In  his  speech  of  7th  February,  1861,  he  said: 

"  I  do  not  wish  to  say  one  word  which  will  exasperate  the  already 
too  much  inflamed  state  of  the  public  mind ;  but  I  will  say  that  the 
Constitution  of  the  United  States,  and  the  laws  made  in  pursuance 
thereof,  must  he  enforced;  and  they  who  stand  across  the  path  of  that 
enforcement  must  either  destroy  the  power  of  the  United  States,  or 
it  will  destroy  them" 

For  such  utterances  only  a  small  part  of  the  people 
of  his  State  was  on  that  day  prepared.  Seduced  by  the 
wish,  they  still  believed  that  the  Union  could  be  pre 
served  by  fair  and  mutual  concessions.  They  were  on 


_......,...„, a 

OF  HENRY  WINTER  DAVIS.  25 

their  knees  praying  for  peace,  ignorant  that  bloody  war 
had  already  girded  on  his  sword.  His  language  was 
then  deemed  too  harsh  and  unconciliatory,  and  hundreds, 
I  among  the  number,  denounced  him  in  unmeasured 
terms.  Before  the  expiration  of  three  months  events 
had  demonstrated  his  wisdom  and  our  folly,  and  other 
paragraphs  from  that  same  speech  became  the  fighting 
creed  of  the  Union  men  of  Maryland.  He  further  said, 
on  that  occasion : 

"  But,  sir,  there  is  one  State  I  can  speak  for,  and  that  is  the  State 
of  Maryland.  Confident  in  the  strength  of  this  great  government 
to  protect  every  interest,  grateful  for  almost  a  century  of  unalloyed 
blessings,  she  has  fomented  no  agitation ;  she  has  done  no  act  to  dis 
turb  the  public  peace ;  she  has  rested  in  the  consciousness  that  if 
there  be  wrong  the  Congress  of  the  United  States  will  remedy  it ; 
and  that  none  exists  which  revolution  would  not  aggravate. 

"  Mr.  Speaker,  I  am  here  this  day  to  speak,  and  I  say  that  I  do 
speak,  for  the  people  of  Maryland,  who  are  loyal  to  the  United 
States;  and  that  when  my  judgment  is  contested,  I  appeal  to  the 
people  for  its  accuracy,  and  I  am  ready  to  maintain  it  before  them. 

"  In  Maryland  we  are  dull,  and  cannot  comprehend  the  right  of 
secession.  We  do  not  recognize  the  right  to  make  a  revolution  by 
a  vote.  We  do  not  recognize  the  right  of  Maryland  to  repeal  the 
Constitution  of  the  United  States,  and  if  any  convention  there,  called 
by  whatever  authority,  under  whatever  auspices,  undertake  to  inau 
gurate  revolution  in  Maryland,  their  authority  will  be  resisted  and 
defied  in  arms  on  the  soil  of  Maryland,  in  the  name  and  by  the 
authority  of  the  Constitution  of  the  United  States." 

Iii  January,  1861,  the  ensign  of  the  Republic,  while 
covering  a  mission  of  mercy,  was  fired  on  by  traitors. 
In  February  Jefferson  Davis  said,  at  Stevenson,  Ala 
bama,  "  We  will  carry  war  where  it  is  easy  to  advance, 
where  food  for  the  sword  and  torch  await  our  armies  in 
the  densely  populated  cities."  In  March  the  thirty- 


26  ORATION  OX  THE  LIFE  AND  CHARACTER 

sixth  Congress,  after  vainly  passing  conciliatory  resolu 
tions  by  the  score,  among  other  things  recommending 
the  repeal  of  all  personal  liberty  bills,  declaring  that 
there  was  no  authority  outside  of  the  States  where 
slavery  was  recognized  to  interfere  with  slaves  or  slavery 
therein,  and  proposing  by  two-thirds  votes  of  both  houses 
an  amendment  of  the  Constitution  prohibiting  any  future 
amendment  giving  Congress  power  over  slavery  in  the 
States,  adjourned  amid  general  terror  and  distress. 

Abraham  Lincoln,  having  passed  through  the  midst 
of  his  enemies,  appeared  at  Washington  in  due  time 
and  delivered  his  inaugural,  closing  with  these  memo 
rable  words : 

"  In  your  hands,  my  dissatisfied  fellow  countrymen,  and  not  in 
mine,  is  the  momentous  issue  of  civil  war.  The  government  will 
not  assail  you. 

"  You  can  have  no  conflict  without  heing  yourselves  the  aggressors. 
You  can  have  no  oath  registered  in  heaven  to  destroy  the  government, 
while  I  shall  have  the  most  solemn  one  to  '  preserve,  protect,  and 
defend'  it. 

"  I  am  loth  to  close.  We  are  not  enemies,  but  friends.  We  must 
not  be  enemies.  Though  passion  may  have  strained,  it  must  not 
break,  our  bonds  of  affection. 

"  The  mystic  chords  of  memory,  stretching  from  every  battle 
field  and  patriot  grave  to  every  living  hearth  and  hearth-stone  all  over 
this  broad  land,  will  yet  swell  the  chorus  of  the  Union,  when  again 
touched,  as  surely  as  they  will  be,  by  the  better  angels  of  our  nature." 

Words  which,  if  human  hearts  do  not  harden  into 
stone,  through  the  long  ages  yet  to  come, 

"Will  plead  like  angels,  trumpet-tongued,  against 
The  deep  damnation  of  his  taking  off." 

The  appeal  was  spurned ;  and,  in  the  face  of  its  al 
most  godlike  gentleness,  they  who  already  gloried  in 


OF  HENRY  WINTER  DAVIS.  27 

their  anticipated  saturnalia  .of  blood  inhumanly  and 
falsely  stigmatized  it  as  a  declaration  of  war.  The  long- 
patient  North,  slow  to  anger,  in  its  agony  still  cried, 
"  My  brother ;  oh,  my  brother  !"  It  remained  for  that 
final,  ineradicable  infamy  of  Sumter  to  arouse  the  nation 
to  arms !  At  last,  to  murder  at  one  blow  the  hopes 
we  had  nursed  so  tenderly,  they  impiously  dragged  in 
the  dust  the  glorious  symbol  of  our  national  life  and 
majesty,  heaping  dishonor  upon  it,  and,  like  the  sneering 
devil  at  the  crucifixion,  crying  out,  "  Come  and  deliver 
thyself!"  and  then  no  man,  with  the  heart  of  a  man, 
who  loved  his  country  and  feared  his  God,  dared  longer 
delay  to  prepare  for  that  great  struggle  which  was  des 
tined  to  rock  the  earth. 

Poor  Maryland !  cursed  with  slavery,  doubly  cursed 
with  traitors !  Mr.  DAVIS  had  said  that  Maryland  was 
loyal  to  the  United  States,  and  had  pledged  himself  to 
maintain  that  position  before  the  people.  The  time 
soon  came  for  him  to  redeem  his  pledge.  On  the  morn 
ing  of  the  15th  of  April  the  President  issued  his  pro 
clamation  calling  a  special  session  of  Congress,  which 
made  an  extra  election  necessary  in  Maryland.  Before 
the  sun  of  that  day  had  gone  down,  this  card  was  pro 
mulgated  : 

To  the  voters  of  the  fourth  congressional  district  of  Maryland : 

I  hereby  announce  myself  as  a  candidate  for  the  House  of  Rep 
resentatives  of  the  37th  Congress  of  the  United  States  of  America, 
upon  the  basis  of  the  unconditional  maintenance  of  the  Union. 

Should  my  fellow-citizens  of  like  views  manifest  their  preference 
for  a  different  candidate  on  that  basis,  it  is  not  my  purpose  to  em 
barrass  them. 

II.  WINTER  DAVIS. 
APRIL  15,  1861. 


28  ORATION  ON  THE  LIFE  AND  CHARACTER 

But  dark  days  were  coming  for  Baltimore.  A  mob, 
systematically  organized  in  complicity  with  the  rebels 
at  Richmond  and  Harper's  Ferry,  seized  and  kept  in 
subjection  an  unsuspecting  and  unarmed  population  from 
the  19th  to  the  24th  of  April.  For  six  days  murder 
and  treason  held  joint  sway ;  and  at  the  conclusion  of 
their  tragedy  of  horrid  barbarities  they  gave  the  farce 
of  holding  an  election  for  members  of  the  house  of 
delegates. 

To  show  the  spirit  that  moved  Mr.  DAVIS  under 
this  ordeal,  I  cite  from  his  letter,  written  on  the  28th, 
to  Hon.  William  II.  Seward,  the  following: 

"  I  have  been  trying  to  collect  the  persons  appointed  scattered  by 
the  storm,  and  to  compel  them  to  take  their  offices  or  to  decline. 

"  I  have  sought  men  of  undoubted  courage  and  capacity  for  the 
places  vacated. 

"  We  must  show  the  secessionists  that  we  are  not  frightened,  but 
are  resolved  to  maintain  the  government  in  the  exercise  of  all  its 
functions  in  Maryland. 

"  We  have  organized  a  guard,  who  will  accompany  the  officers  and 
hold  the  public  buildings  against  all  the  secessionists  in  Maryland. 

"  A  great  reaction  has  set  in.  If  we  now  act  promptly  the  day  is 
ours  and  the  State  is  safe." 

These  matters  being  adjusted,  he  immediately  took 
the  field  for  Congress  on  his  platform  against  Mr.  Henry 
May,  conservative  Union,  and  in  the  iace  of  an  opposi 
tion  which  few  men  have  dared  to  encounter,  he  carried 
on,  unremittingly  from  that  time  until  the  election  on 
the  13th  of  June,  the  most  brilliant  campaign  against 
open  traitors,  doubters,  and  dodgers,  that  unrivalled 
eloquence,  courage,  and  activity  could  achieve.  Every 
where,  day  and  night,  in  sunshine  and  storm,  in  the 


OF  HENRY  WINTER  DAVIS.  29 

market-houses,  at  the  street  corners,  and  in  the  public 
halls,  his  voice  rang  out  clear,  loud,  and  defiant  for  the 
"unconditional  maintenance"  of  the  Union.  He  was 
defeated,  but  he  sanctified  the  name  of  unconditional 
union  in  the  vocabulary  of  every  true  Marylander.  He 
gathered  but  6,000  votes  out  of  14,000,  yet  the  result 
was  a  triumph  which  gave  him  the  real  fruits  of  vic 
tory;  and  he  exclaimed  to  a  friend,  with  laudable  pride, 
"  With  six  thousand  of  the  workingmen  of  Baltimore 
on  my  side,  won  in  such  a  contest,  I  defy  them  to  take 
the  State  out  of  the  Union  "  Though  not  elected,  he 
never  ceased  his  efforts.  With  us  it  was  a  struggle  for 
homes,  hearths,  and  lives.  He  said  at  Brooklyn : 

"  You  see  the  conflagration  from  a  distance ;  it  blisters  me  at  my 
side.  You  can  survive  the  integrity  of  the  nation;  we  in  Maryland 
would  live  on  the  side  of  a  gulf,  perpetually  tending  to  plunge  into 
its  depths.  It  is  for  us  life  and  liberty ;  it  is  for  you  greatness, 
strength,  and  prosperity." 

Nothing  appalled  him;  nothing  deterred  him.  He 
said,  at  Baltimore,  in  1861  : 

"  The  War  Department  has  been  taught  by  the  misfortune  at  Bull 
Run,  which  has  broken  no  power  nor  any  spirit,  which  bowed  no 
State  nor  made  any  heart  falter,  which  was  felt  as  a  humiliation  that 
has  brought  forth  wisdom." 

He  also  said,  speaking  of  the  rebels,  and  foretelling 
his  own  fate,  if  they  succeeded  in  Maryland  : 

"  They  have  inaugurated  an  era  of  confiscations,  proscriptions, 
and  exiles.  Read  their  acts  of  greedy  confiscation,  their  law  of 
proscriptions  by  the  thousands.  Behold  the  flying  exiles  from  the 
unfriendly  soil  of  Virginia,  Tennessee,  and  Missouri." 

And  so  he  worked  on,  never  abating  one  jot  of  his 
uncompromising  devotion  to  the  Union,  like  a  second 


30 


ORATION  ON  THE  LIFE  AND  CHARACTER 


Peter  the  Hermit,  preaching  a  cause,  as  he  believed, 
truly  represented  by  insignia  as  sacred  as  the  Cross,  and 
for  which  no  sacrifice,  not  even  death,  was  too  great. 

But  his  crowning  glory  was  his  leadership  of  the 
emancipation  movement.  The  rebels,  notwithstanding 
"  My  Maryland's"  bloody  welcome  at  South  Mountain 
and  Antietam,  claimed  that  she  must  belong  to  their 
confederacy  because  of  the  homogeneousness  of  her 
institutions.  They  contended  that  the  fetters  of  slavery 
formed  a  chain  that  stretched  across  the  Potomac,  and 
held  in  bondage  not  only  87,000  slaves,  but  600,000 
white  people  also.  Their  constant  theme  was  "  the  de 
liverance"  of  Maryland.  We  resolved  to  break  that  last 
tie,  and  to  take  position  unalterably  on  the  side  of  the 
Union  and  freedom,  and  thus  to  deal  the  final  blow  to 
the  cause  and  support  of  rebellion.  We  organized  our 
little  band,  almost  ridiculous  from  its  want  of  numbers, 
early  in  1863.  A  Sibley  tent  would  have  held  our 
whole  army.  Our  enemies  laughed  us  to  scorn,  and 
the  politicians  would  not  accept  our  help  on  any  terms, 
but  denied  us  as  earnestly  as  Peter  denied  his  Lord. 
Mr.  DAVIS  was  our  acknowledged  leader,  and  it  was  in 
the  heat  and  fury  of  the  contest  which  followed  that 
our  hearts  were  welded  into  permanent  friendship.  He 
was  the  platform  maker,  and  he  announced  it  in  a  few 
lines : 

"  A  hearty  support  of  the  entire  policy  of  the  national  administra 
tion,  including  immediate  emancipation  by  constitutional  means." 

It  was  very  short,  but  it  covered  all  the  ground. 
The  campaign  opened  by  the  publication  of  an  address, 
written  by  Mr.  DAVIS,  to  the  people  of  Maryland,  which, 


OF  HENRY  WINTER  DAVIS.  31 


I  venture  to  say,  is  unsurpassed  by-  any  state  paper  pub 
lished  in  this  age  of  able  state  papers  for  the  warmth 
and  vigor  of  its  diction,  and  the  lucidity  and  conclusive- 
ness  of  its  argumentation.  It  is  a  pamphlet  of  twenty 
pages,  glowing  throughout  with  the  unmistakable  marks 
of  his  genius  and  patriotism,  and  closing  with  these 
words  of  stirring  cheer : 

"  We  do  not  doubt  the  result,  and  expect,  freed  from  the  trammels 
which  now  bind  her,  to  see  Maryland,  at  no  distant  day,  rapidly 
advancing  in  a  course  of  unexampled  prosperity  with  her  sister  free 
States  of  the  undivided  and  indivisible  Republic." 

Mr.  DAVIS  was  ubiquitous.  He  was  the  life  and  soul 
of  the  whole  contest.  He  arranged  the  order  of  battle, 
dictated  the  correspondence,  wrote  the  important  articles 
for  the  newspapers,  and  addressed  all  the  concerted 
meetings.  In  short,  neither  his  voice  nor  his  pen  rested 
in  all  the  time  of  our  travail.  He  would  have  no  com 
promise  ;  but  rejected  all  overtures  of  the  enemy  short 
of  unconditional  surrender.  On  the  Eastern  Shore  he 
spoke  with  irresistible  power  at  Elkton,  Easton,  Salis 
bury,  and  Snow  Hill,  at  each  of  the  three  last-named 
towns  with  a  crowd  of  wondering  "American  citizens  of 
African  descent"  listening  to  him  from  afar,  and  looking 
upon  him  as  if  they  believed  him  to  be  the  seraph 
Abdiel.  His  last  appointment,  in  extreme  southern 
Maryland,  he  filled  on  Friday,  after  which,  bidding  me  a 
cordial  God-speed,  he  descended  from  the  stand,  sprang 
into  an  open  wagon  awaiting  him,  travelled  eighty  miles 
through  a  raw  night-air,  reached  Cambridge  by  daylight, 
and  then  crossed  the  Chesapeake,  sixty  miles,  in  time 
to  close  the  campaign  with  one  of  his  ringing  speeches 


32  ORATION  ON  THE  LIFE  AND  CHARACTER 

in  Monument  square,  Baltimore,  on  Saturday  night.  In 
this,  our  first  contest,  we  were  completely  victorious. 

But  we  had  yet  a  weary  \vay  before  us.  The  legisla 
ture  had  then  to  pass  a  law  calling  a  convention.  That 
law  had  to  be  approved  by  a  majority  of  the  people. 
Members  of  the  convention  had  then  to  be  elected  in 
all  parts  of  the  State,  and  the  Constitution  which  they 
adopted  had  to  be  carried  by  a  majority  of  the  popular 
vote.  He  allowed  himself  no  reprieve  from  labor  until 
all  this  had  been  accomplished.  And  when  the  rest  of 
us,  worn  out  by  incessant  toil,  gladly  sought  rest,  he 
went  before  the  court  of  appeals  to  maintain  every 
thing  that  had  been  done  against  all  comers,  and  did  so 
triumphantly. 

Let  free  Maryland  never  forget  the  debt  of  eternal 
gratitude  she  owes  to  HENRY  WINTER  DAVIS. 

If  oratory  means  the  power  of  presenting  thoughts 
by  public  and  sustained  speech  to  an  audience  in  the 
manner  best  adapted  to  win  a  favorable  decision  of  the 
question  at  issue,  then  Mr.  DAVIS  assuredly  occupied 
the  highest  position  as  an  orator.  He  always  held  his 
hearers  in  rapt  attention  until  he  closed,  and  then  they 
lingered  about  to  discuss  with  one  another  what  they 
had  heard.  I  have  seen  a  promiscuous  assembly,  made 
up  of  friends  and  opponents,  remain  exposed  to  a  beat 
ing  rain  for  two  hours  rather  than  forego  hearing  him. 
Those  who  had  heard  him  most  frequently  were  always 
ready  to  make  the  greatest  effort  to  hear  him  again. 
Even  his  bitterest  enemies  have  been  known  to  stand 
shivering  on  the  street  corners  for  a  whole  evening, 
charmed  by  his  marvelous  tongue.  His  stump  efforts 


OF  HENRY  WINTER  DAVIS.  33 


never  fell  below  his  high  standard.  He  never  con 
descended  to  a  mere  attempt  to  amuse.  He  always 
spoke  to  instruct,  to  convince,  and  to  persuade  through 
the  higher  and  better  avenues  to  favor.  I  never  heard 
him  deliver  a  speech  that  was  not  worthy  of  being 
printed  and  preserved.  As  a  stump  orator  he  was 
unapproachable,  in  my  estimation,  and  I  say  that  with 
a  clear  recollection  of  having  heard,  when  a  boy,  that 
wonder  of  Yankee  birth  and  southern  development,  S. 
S.  Prentiss. 

Mr.  DAVIS'S  ripe  scholarship  promptly  tendered  to  his 
thought  the  happiest  illustrations  and  the  most  appro 
priate  forms  of  expression.  His  brain  had  beco?iie 
a  teeming  cornucopia,  whence  flowed  in  exhaustless 
profusion  the  most  beautiful  flowers  and  the  most  sub 
stantial  fruits;  and  yet  he  never  indulged  in  excessive 
ornamentation.  His  taste  was  almost  austerely  chaste. 
His  style  was  perspicuous,  energetic,  concise,  and  withal 
highly  elegant.  He  never  loaded  his  sentences  with 
meretricious  finery,  or  high-sounding,  supernumerary 
words.  When  he  did  use  the  jewelry  of  rhetoric,  he 
would  quietly  set  a  metaphor  in  his  page  or  throwr  a 
comparison  into  his  speech  which  would  serve  to  light 
up  with  startling  distinctness  the  collossal  proportions 
of  his  argument.  Of  humor  he  had  none;  but  his  wit 
and  sarcasm  at  times  would  glitter  like  the  brandished 
cimeter  of  Saladin,  and,  descending,  would  cut  as  keenly. 
The  pathetic  he  never  attempted;  but  when  angered  by 
a  malicious  assault  his  invective  was  consuming,  and  his 
epithets  would  wound  like  pellets  of  lead.  Although 


34  ORATION  ON  THE  LIFE  AND   CHARACTER 

gallant  to  the  graces  of  expression,  he  always  compelled 
his  rhetoric  to  act  as  handmaid  to  his  dialectics. 

Style  may  sometimes  be  an  exotic;  but  when  it  is,  it 
is  sure  to  partake  more  and  more,  as  years  increase,  of 
the  peculiarities  of  the  soil  wherein  it  is  nurtured.  But 
the  style  of  Mr.  DAVIS  was  indigenous  and  strongly 
marked  by  his  individuality.  Although  he  doubtless 
admired,  and  perhaps  imitated,  the  condensation  and 
dignity  of  Gibbon,  yet  it  is  certain  that  he  carefully 
avoided  the  monotonous  stateliness  and  the  elaborate 
and  ostentatious  art  of  that  most  erudite  historian.  I 
look  in  vain  for  his  model  in  the  skeptical  Gibbon,  the 
cynical  Bolingbroke,  or  the  gorgeous  Burke.  These 
were  all  to  him  intellectual  giants;  but  giants  of  false 
belief  and  practice.  Not  even  from  Tacitus,  upon  whom 
he  looked  with  the  greatest  favor,  could  he  have  acquired 
his  burning  and  impressive  diction. 

HENRY  WINTER  DAVIS  was  a  man  of  faith,  and 
believed  in  Christ  and  his  fellow-man.  His  heart  and 
mind  were  both  nourished  into  their  full  dimensions 
under  the  fostering  influences  of  our  free  institutions; 
so  that,  being  reared  a  freeman,  he  thought  and  spake 
as  became  a  freeman.  No  other  land  could  have  pro 
duced  such  dauntless  courage  and  such  heroic  devotion 
to  honest  conviction  in  a  public  man;  and  even  our  land 
has  produced  but  few  men  of  his  stamp  and  ability. 
His  implicit  faith  in  God's  eternal  justice,  and  his  grand 
moral  courage,  imparted  to  him  his  proselyting  zeal,  and 
gave  him  that  amazing,  kindling  power  which  enabled 
him  to  light  the  fires  of  enthusiasm  wherever  he  touched 
the  public  mind. 


OF  HENRY  WINTER  DAVIS.  35 

To  show  his  power  in  extemporaneous  debate,  as 
well  as  his  determined  patriotism,  I  will  introduce  a 
passage  from  his  speech  of  April  11,  18G4,  delivered  in 
the  House  of  Representatives.  You  will  remember 
that  the  end  of  the  rebellion  had  not  then  appeared- 
Grant,  with  his  invincible  legions,  had  not  started  to  exe 
cute  that  greatest  military  movement  of  modern  times, 
by  which,  after  months  of  bloody  persistence,  hurling 
themselves  continually  against  what  seemed  the  frowning 
front  of  destiny,  they  finally  drove  the  enemy  from  his 
strongholds,  made  Fortune  herself  captive,  and,  binding 
her  to  their  standards,  held  her  there  until  the  surrender 
of  every  rebel  in  arms  closed  the  war  amid  the  exultant 
plaudits  of  men  and  angels.  Our  hopes  had  not  then 
grown  into  victory,  and  we  looked  forward  anxiously  to 
the  terrible  march  from  the  Rappahannock  to  Rich 
mond.  Thinking  that  perhaps  our  army  stood  appalled 
before  the  great  duty  required  of  it,  and  that  the  people 
might  be  diverted  from  their  purpose  to  crush  the 
rebellion  when  they  saw  that  it  could  only  be  accom 
plished  at  the  cost  of  an  ocean  of  human  blood,  a  call 
was  made  on  the  floor  of  the  American  Congress  for  a 
recognition  of  the  southern  confederacy.  Speaking  for 
the  nation,  Mr.  DAVIS  said: 

"  But,  Mr.  Speaker,  if  it  be  said  that  a  time  may  come  when  the 
question  of  recognizing  the  southern  confederacy  will  have  to  be 
answered,  I  admit  it.  *  *  *  *  When  the  people,  exhausted 
by  taxation,  weary  of  sacrifices,  drained  of  blood,  betrayed  by  their 
rulers,  deluded  by  demagogues  into  believing  that  peace  is  the  way 
to  union,  and  submission  the  path  to  victory,  shall  throw  down  their 
arms  before  the  advancing  foe ;  when  vast  chasms  across  every 
State  shall  make  it  apparent  to  every  eye,  when  too  late  to  remedy 


36  ORATION  ON  THE  LIFE  AND  CHARACTER 


it,  that  division  from  the  south  is  anarchy  at  the  north,  and  that 
peace  without  union  is  the  end  of  the  Republic;  then  the  indepen 
dence  of  the  south  will  be  an  accomplished  fact,  and  gentlemen  may, 
without  treason  to  the  dead  Republic,  rise  in  this  migratory  house, 
wherever  it  may  then  be  in  America,  and  declare  themselves  for 
recognizing  their  masters  at  the  south  rather  than  exterminating 
them.  Until  that  day,  in  the  name  of  the  American  nation ;  in  the 
name  of  every  house  in  the  land  where  there  is  one  dead  for  the  holy 
cause;  in  the  name  of  those  who  stand  before  us  in  the  ranks  of 
battle ;  in  the  name  of  the  liberty  our  ancestors  have  confided  to  us, 
I  devote  to  eternal  execration  the  name  of  him  who  shall  propose  to 
destroy  this  blessed  land  rather  than  its  enemies. 

"  But  until  that  time  arrive  it  is  the  judgment  of  the  American 
people  there  shall  be  no  compromise  ;  that  ruin  to  ourselves  or  ruin 
to  the  southern  rebels  are  the  only  alternatives.  It  is  only  by  reso 
lutions  of  this  kind  that  nations  can  rise  above  great  dangers  and 
overcome  them  in  crises  like  this.  It  was  only  by  turning  France 
into  a  camp,  resolved  that  Europe  might  exterminate  but  should  not 
subjugate  her,  that  France  is  the  leading  empire  of  Europe  to-day. 
It  is  by  such  a  resolve  that  the  American  people,  coercing  a  reluctant 
government  to  draw  the  sword  and  stake  the  national  existence  on 
the  integrity  of  the  Republic,  are  now  anything  but  the  fragments  of 
a  nation  before  the  world,  the  scorn  and  hiss  of  every  petty  tyrant. 
It  is  because  the  people  of  the  United  States,  rising  to  the  height  of 
the  occasion,  dedicated  this  generation  to  the  sword,  and  pouring  out 
the  blood  of  their  children  as  of  no  account,  and  vowing  before  high 
Heaven  that  there  should  be  no  end  to  this  conflict  but  ruin  absolute 
or  absolute  triumph,  that  we  now  are  what  we  are  ;  that  the  banner 
of  the  Republic,  still  pointing  onward,  floats  proudly  in  the  face  of 
the  enemy ;  that  vast  regions  are  reduced  to  obedience  to  the  laws, 
and  that  a  great  host  in  armed  array  now  presses  with  steady  step 
into  the  dark  regions  of  the  rebellion.  It  is  only  by  the  earnest  and 
abiding  resolution  of  the  people  that,  whatever  shall  be  our  fate,  it 
shall  be  grand  as  the  American  nation,  worthy  of  that  Republic  which 
first  trod  the  path  of  empire  and  made  no  peace  but  under  the  banners 
of  victory,  that  the  American  people  will  survive  in  history.  And 
that  will  save  us.  We  shall  succeed,  and  not  fail.  I  have  an  abiding 
confidence  in  the  firmness,  the  patience,  the  endurance  of  the  Ameri- 


OF  HENRY  WINTER  DAVIS. 


can  people;  and,  Laving  vowed  to  stand  in  history  on  the  great 
resolve  to  accept  of  nothing  but  victory  or  ruin,  victory  is  ours. 
And  if  with  such  heroic  resolve  we  fall,  we  fall  with  honor,  and 
transmit  the  name  of  liberty,  committed  to  our  keeping,  untarnished, 
to  go  down  to  future  generations.  The  historian  of  our  decline  and 
fall,  contemplating  the  ruins  of  the  last  great  Republic,  and  drawing 
from  its  fate  lessons  of  wisdom  on  the  waywardness  of  men,  shall 
drop  a  tear  as  he  records  with  sorrow  the  vain  heroism  of  that  people 
who  dedicated  and  sacrificed  themselves  to  the  cause  of  freedom,  and 
by  their  example  will  keep  alive  her  worship  in  the  hearts  of  men 
till  happier  generations  shall  learn  to  walk  in  her  paths.  Yes,  sir,  if 
we  must  fall,  let  our  last  hours  be  stained  by  no  weakness.  If  we 
must  fall,  let  us  stand  amid  the  crash  of  the  falling  Republic  and  be 
buried  in  its  ruins,  so  that  history  may  take  note  that  men  lived  in 
the  middle  of  the  nineteenth  century  worthy  of  a  better  fate,  but 
chastised  by  God  for  the  sins  of  their  forefathers.  Let  the  ruins  of 
the  Republic  remain  to  testify  to  the  latest  generations  our  greatness 
and  our  heroism.  And  let  Liberty,  crownless  and  childless,  sit  upon 
these  ruins,  crying  aloud  in  a  sad  wail  to  the  nations  of  the  world, 
'  I  nursed  and  brought  up  children  and  they  have  rebelled  against 
me.'" 

Mr.  D AVIS' s  most  striking  characteristics  were  his  de 
votion  to  principle  and  his  indomitable  courage.  There 
never  was  a  moment  when  he  could  be  truthfully  charged 
with  trimming  or  insincerity.  His  views  were  always 
clearly  avowed  and  fearlessly  maintained.  He  hated 
slavery,  and  he  did  not  attempt  to  conceal  it.  He 
remembered  the  lessons  of  his  youth,  and  his  heart 
rebelled  against  the  injustice  of  the  system.  His  antip 
athy  was  deeply  grounded  in  his  convictions,  and  he 
could  not  be  dissuaded,  nor  frightened,  nor  driven  from 
expressing  it. 

He  was  not  a  great  captain,  nor  a  mighty  ruler;  he 
was  only  one  of  the  people,  but,  nevertheless,  a  hero. 


38  ORATION  ON  THE  LIFE  AND   CHARACTER 

Born  under  the  flag  of  a  nation  which  claimed  for  its 
cardinal  principle  of  government,  that  all  men  are 
created  free,  yet  held  in  abject  slavery  four  millions  of 
human  beings;  which  erected  altars  to  the  living  God, 
yet  denied  to  creatures,  formed  in  the  image  of  God 
and  charged  with  the  custody  of  immortal  souls,  the 
common  rights  of  humanity ;  he  declared  that  the 
hateful  inconsistency  should  cease  to  defile  the  prayers 
of  Christians  and  stultify  the  advocates  of  freedom. 
No  dreamer  was  he,  no  mere  theorist,  but  a  worker, 
and  a  strong  one,  who  did  well  the  work  committed  to 
him.  He  entered  upon  his  self-imposed  task  when 
surrounded  by  slaves  and  slave-owners.  He  stood  face 
to  face  with  the  iniquitous  superstition,  and  to  their 
teeth  defied  its  worshipers.  To  make  proselytes  he 
had  to  conquer  prejudices,  correct  traditions,  elevate 
duty  above  interest,  and  induce  men  who  had  been  the 
propagandists  of  slavery  to  become  its  destroyers. 
Think  you  his  work  was  easy?  Count  the  long  years 
of  his  unequal  strife;  gather  from  the  winds,  which 
scattered  them,  the  curses  of  his  foes ;  suffer  under  all 
the  annoyances  and  insults  which  malice  and  falsehood 
can  invent,  and  you  will  then  understand  how  much  of 
heart  and  hope,  of  courage  and  self-relying  zeal,  were 
required  to  make  him  what  he  was,  and  to  qualify  him 
to  do  what  he  did.  And  what  did  he  I  When  the 
rough  hand  of  war  had  stripped  off  the  pretexts  which 
enveloped  the  rebellion,  and  it  became  evident  that 
slavery  had  struck  at  the  life  of  the  Republic,  unmind 
ful  of  consequences  to  himself,  he,  among  the  first, 
arraigned  the  real  traitor  and  demanded  the  penalty  of 


OF  HENRY  WINTER  DAVIS.  39 


death.  The  denunciations  that  fell  upon  him  like  a 
cloud  wrapped  him  in  a  mantle  of  honor,  and  more 
truthfully  than  the  great  Roman  orator  he  could  have 
exclaimed,  "  Ego  hoc  animo  semperfui,  ut  invidiam 
virtute partam,  gloriam  non  invidiam  putare?n" 

This  man,  so  stern  and  inflexible  in  the  execution  of 
a  purpose,  so  rigorous  in  his  demands  of  other  men  in 
behalf  of  a  principle,  so  indifferent  to  preferment  and 
all  base  objects  of  pursuit,  had  a  monitor  to  whom  he 
always  gave  an  open  ear  and  a  prompt  assent.  It  was 
no  demon  like  that  which  attended  Socrates,  no  witch 
like  that  invoked  by  Saul,  no  fiend  like  that  to  which 
Faust  resigned  himself  A  vision  of  light  and  life  and 
beauty  flitted  ever  palpably  before  him,  and  wooed  him 
to  the  perpetual  service  of  the  good  and  true  The 
memory  of  a  pious  and  beloved  mother  permeated  his 
whole  moral  being,  and  kept  warm  within  him  the  ten- 
derest  affection.  Hear  how  he  wrote  of  her : 

"  My  mother  was  a  lady  of  graceful  and  simple  manners,  fair 
complexion,  blue  eyes,  and  auburn  hair,  with  a  rich  and  exquisite 
voice,  that  still  thrills  my  memory  with  the  echo  of  its  vanished 
music.  She  was  highly  educated  for  her  day,  when  Annapolis  was 
the  focus  of  intellect  and  fashion  for  Maryland,  and  its  fruits  shone 
through  her  conversation,  and  colored  and  completed  her  natural 
eloquence,  which  my  father  used  to  say  would  have  made  her  an 
orator,  if  it  had  not  been  thrown  away  on  a  woman.  She  was  the 
incarnation  of  all  that  is  Christian  in  life  and  hope,  in  charity  and 
thought,  ready  for  every  good  work,  herself  the  example  of  all  she 
taught." 

It  was  the  force  of  her  precept  and  example  that 
formed  the  man,  and  supplied  him  with  his  shield  and 
buckler.  His  private  life  was  spotless.  His  habits 


40  ORATION  ON  THE  LIFE  AND   CHARACTER 


were  regular  and  abstemious,  and  his  practice  in  close 
conformity  with  the  Episcopal  church,  of  which  he  was 
a  member.  He  invariably  attended  divine  service  on 
Sunday,  and  confined  himself  for  the  remainder  of  the 
day  to  a  course  of  religious  reading.  If  from  his  faiher 
he  drew  a  courage  and  a  fierce  determination  before 
which  his  enemies  fled  in  confusion,  from  his  mother 
he  inherited  those  milder  qualities  that  won  for  him 
friends  as  true  and  devoted  as  man  ever  possessed. 
Some  have  said  he  was  hard  and  dictatorial.  They 
had  seen  him  only  when  a  high  resolve  had  fired  his 
breast,  and  when  the  gleam  of  battle  had  lighted  his 
countenance.  His  friends  saw  deeper,  and  knew  that 
beneath  the  exterior  he  assumed  in  his  struggles  with 
the  world  there  beat  a  heart  as  pure  and  unsullied,  as 
confiding  and  as  gentle,  as  ever  sanctified  the  domestic 
circle,  or  made  loved  ones  happy.  His  heart  reminded 
me  of  a  spring  among  the  hills  of  the  Susquehanna,  to 
which  I  often  resorted  in  my  youth ;  around  a  part  of 
it  we  boys  had  built  a  stone  wall  to  protect  it  from  out 
rage,  while  on  the  side  next  home  we  left  open  a  path, 
easily  traveled  by  familiar  feet,  and  leading  straight  to 
the  sweet  and  perennial  waters  within. 

He  lived  to  hear  the  salvos  that  announced,  after 
more  than  two  centuries  of  bondage,  the  redemption  of 
his  native  State.  He  lived  to  vote  for  that  grand  act  of 
enfranchisement  that  wiped  from  the  escutcheon  of  the 
nation  the  leprous  stain  of  slavery,  and  to  know  that  the 
Constitution  of  the  United  States  no  longer  recognized 
and  protected  property  in  man.  He  lived  to  witness 
the  triumph  of  his  country  in  its  desperate  struggle 


OF  HENRY  WINTER  DAVIS.  41 

with  treason,  and  to  behold  all  its  enemies,  either  wan 
derers,  like  Cain,  over  the  earth,  or  suppliants  for  mercy 
at  her  feet.  He  lived  to  catch  the  first  glimpse  of  the 
coming  glory  of  that  new  era  of  progress  that  matchless 
valor  had  won  through  the  blood  and  carnage  of  a  thou 
sand  battle-fields.  He  lived,  through  all  the  storm  of 
war,  to  see,  at  last,  America  rejuvenated,  rescued  from 
the  grasp  of  despotism,  and  rise  victorious,  with  her 
garments  purified  and  her  brow  radiant  with  the  un 
sullied  light  of  liberty.  He  lived  to  greet  the  return 
of  "  meek-eyed  peace,"  and  then  he  gently  laid  his  head 
upon  her  bosom,  and  breathed  out  there  his  noble  spirit. 

The  sword  may  rust  in  its  scabbard,  and  so  let  it; 
but  free  men,  with  free  thought  and  free  speech,  will 
wage  unceasing  war  until  truth  shall  be  enthroned  and 
sit  empress  of  the  world.  Would  to  God  that  he  had 
been  spared  to  complete  a  life  of  three  score  and  ten 
years,  for  the  sake  of  his  country  and  posterity.  When 
I  think  of  the  good  he  would  have  accomplished  had 
he  survived  for  twenty  years,  I  can  say,  in  the  language 
of  Fisher  Ames,  "  My  heart,  penetrated  with  the  remem 
brance  of  the  man,  grows  liquid  as  I  speak,  and  I  could 
pour  it  out  like  water." 

At  the  portals  of  his  tomb  we  may  bid  farewell  to 
the  faithful  Christian,  in  the  full  assurance  that  a  blessed 
life  awaits  him  beyond  the  grave.  Serenely  and  trust 
fully  he  has  passed  from  our  sight  and  gone  down  into 
the  dark  waters. 

"  So  sinks  the  day-star  in  the  ocean  bed, 
And  yet  anon  repairs  his  drooping  head, 
And  tricks  his  beams,  and  with  new-spangled  ore 
Flames  in  the  forehead  of  the  morning  sky." 


42  ORATION  ON  THE  LIFE  AND   CHARACTER 

From  this  hall,  where  as  scholar,  statesman,  and 
orator  he  shone  so  brightly,  he  has  disappeared  forever. 
Never  again  will  he,  answering  to  the  roll-eall  from  this 
desk,  respond  for  his  country  and  the  rights  of  man. 
No  more  shall  we  hear  his  fervid  eloquence  in  the  day 
of  imminent  peril,  invoking  us,  who  hold  the  mighty 
power  of  peace  and  war,  to  dedicate  ourselves,  if  need 
be,  to  the  sword,  but  to  accept  no  end  of  the  conflict 
save  that  of  absolute  triumph  for  our  country.  He  has 
gone  to  answer  the  great  roll-call  above,  where  the 
"  brazen  throat  of  war"  is  voiceless  in  the  presence  of 
the  Prince  of  Peace.  Let  us  habitually  turn  to  his 
recorded  words,  and  gather  wisdom  as  from  the  testa 
ment  of  a  departed  sage ;  and  since  we  were  witnesses 
of  his  tireless  devotion  to  the  cause  of  human  freedom, 
let  us  direct  that  on  the  monument  which  loving  hearts 
and  willing  hands  will  soon  erect  over  his  remains,  there 
shall  be  deeply  engraved  the  figure  of  a  bursting  shackle, 
as  the  emblem  of  the  faith  in  which  he  lived  and  died. 

For  the  Christian,  scholar,  statesman,  and  orator,  all 
good  men  are  mourners ;  but  what  shall  I  say  of  that 
grief  which  none  can  share — the  grief  of  sincere  friend 
ship  ? 

Oh,  my  friend!  comforted  by  the  belief  that  you, 
while  living,  deemed  me  worthy  to  be  your  companion, 
and  loaded  me  with  the  proofs  of  your  esteem,  I  shall 
fondly  treasure,  during  my  remaining  years,  the  recol 
lection  of  your  smile  and  counsel.  Lost  to  me  is  the 
strong  arm  whereon  I  have  so  often  leaned ;  but  in  that 
path  which  in  time  past  we  trod  most  joyfully  together, 
I  shall  continue,  as  God  shall  give  me  to  see  my  duty, 


OF  HENRY  WINTER  DAVIS.  43 

with  unfaltering  though  perhaps  with  unskilful  steps, 
right  onward  to  the  end. 

Admiring  his  brilliant  intellect  and  varied  acquire* 
ments,  his  invincible  courage  and  unswerving  fortitude, 
glorying  in  his  good  works  and  fair  renown,  but,  more 
than  all,  loving  the  man,  I  shall  endeavor  to  assuage  the 
bitterness  of  grief  by  applying  to  him  those  words  of 
proud,  though  tearful,  satisfaction,  from  which  the  faith 
ful  Tacitus  drew  consolation  for  the  loss  of  that  noble 
Roman  whom  he  delighted  to  honor : 

"  Quidquid  ex  Agricola  amavimus,  quidquid  mirati  sumus,  manet 
mansurumque  est,  in  animis  hominum,  in  seternitate  temporum,  fama 
rerum." 


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